


Broken

by shakespearespaz



Category: Revolution (TV)
Genre: Episode Related, F/M, One Shot
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-03-28
Updated: 2013-03-28
Packaged: 2017-12-06 20:09:31
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 708
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/739622
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/shakespearespaz/pseuds/shakespearespaz
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Post 1x11 The Stand.  Rachel found him in the furthest storeroom in the complex, but she understood that it could never be far enough from the smell of death.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Broken

She wanted comfort. Aaron would only glare at her, Nora was a stranger and Charlie, Charlie she was supposed to comfort.

Rachel held her daughter for hours that seemed like only minutes, for an eternity of having even one child safe in her arms would still be too short a time. The tears came and went, as did apologies bound to be void in the morning; for then they were enough. Eventually, however, she had to release the only member of her family she had left. Charlie needed to work through this alone.

She did too, but in the quiet of her head all she could hear was the hovering of helicopter blades, and shutting her eyes made them sting from gunpowder and debris, the only alternative sensation the memory of her hands red and slick with her son’s blood.

Rachel found him in the furthest storeroom in the complex, but she understood that it could never be far enough from the smell of death. His head was fallen forward, tears hidden if they were there.

Like it always had been with them, the anger came first.

“Don’t we all wish we could hide away like you.” Her voice was low and vicious, devastation refusing to be vulnerable for this man.

Her accusative tone was not loud enough to echo off the dust and metal, only to suspend midair in the silence that followed. The anger diffused as quickly as it had come.

Miles did not look up.

“I killed him.”

His voice was broken. He was broken.

A hollow, dry sob broke through from Rachel.

They were broken.

Miles lifted his head gently, but could not find her eyes, only a mass of blonde curls as her face sunk into her hands.

He rose and braced himself against the wall, watching Rachel try not to cry. He wanted to go to her, to hold her and for her to hold him and placate this eternal twisting of self-loathing with hushed words of forgiveness. But Danny was lost and one wrong move and he would lose her too, again maybe, or maybe it was already too late for them.

“If we’d been earlier—or even not at all.” The jarred words were pushed out of her, shallow breaths cutting in while clarity was forgotten.

Miles forced himself to stand up straight and closed the distance, years and miles separating them.

“I can’t protect—as soon as I get—”

She had no more words, only the guilt and the grief that threatened to consume.

He reached forward tentatively; maybe a touch was all they needed.

“It should’ve been me,” he whispered.

As his hand made contact with her, she pushed back violently. Tears fled down her red cheeks and she tried to retreat, as if one step back could return her to some semblance of normality and erase this world where physical pain only ended to be replaced by soul shattering loss.

Instead she stumbled along the way, an ungracious movement caught by Miles’ shaking but quick hand.

“Rachel—” He refused to let her go, arm wrapping around her for support, head tilting forward.

“It should’ve been no one,” she croaked out.

Mile pinched his eyes shut, hand grasping the blue fabric of her shirt and leaning into her.

“I swore I’d never hurt Charlie,” he told her; what had once been a cold, empty promise came through in a rapid but meaningful murmur.

“And you haven’t—”

“I took you away. Now I’ve taken Danny away. And Ben…”

His dead brother and her dead husband had barely taken up a moment of time between them. He was only one among the many demons of their past.

“He looked like you and Ben.” Miles was solemn, but caring.  

An unintelligible noise escaped from Rachel; she was crying, but as they both pressed against each other, her tears were muffled.

“Charlie will hate me again tomorrow. As will you.” 

He could not find the words to tell her that he hated no one more than he hated himself.

They clung together, survivors of a shipwreck drifting toward salvation or darkness. Finally, she opened her mouth to explain the flashing light in her pocket, but choked on the words in her throat.

**Author's Note:**

> I guess I just like a challenge and didn't hate what I saw in the episode. Here's to hoping this relationship on the show continues to surprise and engage me. Thanks for reading!


End file.
